Author, nonfiction book (seminal work): 101 Reasons Why I’m a Vegetarian, Lantern Books
2000-2005
Click for reviews and general information

Founder/COO/publisher, VivaVegie Society
501(c)3 nonprofit 1997-PRESENT
Manage all systems of operations, including database design and management and Web design and maintenance (including PayPal set up for online purchases). Write all grant proposals, raising $30,000 in donations in best year. Generate publicity: coverage gained in The New Yorker, CNN, The New York Times, TIME magazine, the Brian Lehrer Show (guest), among many others. Coordinate events (see below). Coordinate volunteers. Founded Vegetarian Center of NYC in 1999 (still operating in Manhattan), the first of its kind in the nation. Archivist of books, videos, magazines, newsletters, news PDFs, and other digital files for Center. Founded and produced group’s top-quality, original, and incisive magazine (now a Podcast): The VivaVine. Have provided scores of articles, columns, and photography for this magazine. Assigned all articles done by other writers and made all editorial and image decisions. Also, have written articles for other publications, including a major cover story in Vegetarian Voice magazine. Broker all printing and distribution of the group’s publications. Sell display advertising to fund group’s publications. Maintain Yahoo! Groups list. Provide all computer troubleshooting as needed.

Author (hugely popular 16-page pamphlet)
1991-PRESENT
“101 Reasons Why I’m a Vegetarian,” the chief revenue generator and core educational piece of the nonprofit (see above). 20,000 copies printed annually or bi-annually since 1996 (200,000 copies, total, via 11 printings and 7 editions), a third of which have been sold, all to fund nonprofit’s work. Sponsorship boxes sold at $75 each (over 4 dozen per printing). Design, typeset, and prepare digital files for printer.

Sales, outside, offset lithography, typesetting
1989-1996
Staff sales person with Gerson Offset and Alvin J. Bart & Sons. Later, self-employed print broker.
Duties included cold calling to arrange office appointments, recording detailed specifications, presenting and negotiating prices, entertaining clients, plant tours, and press inspections. Accounts landed include Radio City Music Hall, New York Philharmonic, Bessemer Trust, Brooklyn Museum, Oppenheimer & Co., and Bull & Bear Securities, among numerous others. Best year, brought $350,000 in revenue. Represented sheet-fed, full-service printing firms, selling everything from high-end offset color lithography to 1- and 2-color jobs, including custom bindery (die-cutting and -stamping).

Production manager (book publishing)
1981-1989
Held staff positions with Bantam, Doubleday, Dell; Longman; and Nelson Hall
Functioned as purchasing agent for book manufacturing, commercial printing, paper, color separations, press proofs (mass-market covers with heavy special effects), typesetting (including foreign language, math, and music), printed envelopes, stationery, and separate bindery services. Also, performed as graphic designer for promotional pieces and book covers and interiors. Book types included mass market paperbacks, juveniles, college text, trade, and scholarly. Interviewed and fielded calls from vendor sales representatives, prepared cost estimates using scale prices, requested estimates from vendors, chose vendors and prepared purchase orders, followed-up on delivery dates, approved invoices, went on necessary press inspections and plant tours, hired freelancers, kept production schedules (following up at each stage), managed an assistant, attended trade conventions and meetings, kept filing systems for art boards, and acted as general problem solver. Designed a database template in Filemaker Pro utilizing ingenious scripts that input label data automatically

BEFORE 1981

• Production editor/book designer, Nelson-Hall; promoted from this position to production manager
• Proofreader, Media Graphics, an all-business magazine typesetter
• Assistant editor, The Electronic Field Engineer magazine, a newly created position
• Secretary, Supermarket News.

MC/Events coordinator/Speaker
1995-PRESENT
Organized and/or MC’d numerous events for Big Apple Vegetarians, including talk by mayoral hopeful Mark Green (125 guests), Vegan Jeopardy (1996), and the NYC Vegetarian Awards Banquet (1994). Co-curated first-of-its-kind Vegetarian Art Show (1995). On demand give several talks: “Subsidies to the Meat Industry,” “Fish: The Case for Vegetarianism,” and “The Environmental Consequences of Our Meat-Based Diet.”

Computer programs
Quark XPress (expert), Photoshop, MS-Word, Filemaker Pro, and html (all self-taught)

Education
BA, History, Roosevelt University, Chicago. Received Transfer/Upper Division Scholar Award, which paid my tuition for final three years. Completed five courses in an MBA program, University of Illinois at Chicago. Also took the two following industry courses: ”Magazine Layout and Design,” Printing Industries Institute (Chicago) and “Production for Publishers,” Chicago Book Clinic.